Chapter 17

I crave serotoni-...uhh, reviews!

Moved apartments, so that was fun! Living room is choc-a-block with random boxes, but I felt like writing. Currently got internet through a mobile hotspot since the router is buried under the world's biggest game of tetris, but whatever!

So happy to hear that you guys enjoy this stuff! I really mean it when I say it means the world to me to hear that you enjoyed this. Follows and favourites are lovely, but reviews, where you spend time to actually say that you enjoyed something, or that you thought something would work better in another way, are just...so precious to me!

Thank you all!

Chapter 17

"Uchiha Akari, the Hokage requests your presence."

Looking away from Naruto, she turned to stare at the masked visage of an ANBU, smirking as she inhaled. "Hey there Komachi, new mask?" The ANBU in question waited a few moments, staring at her intently, then grabbed her mask and threw it at Akari, eliciting a loud laugh from her even as she tried to reign it in for Naruto's sake, who was sleeping with his head on her lap, mumbling. "Hey, don't blame me that you always wear-" Komachi tossed one of the needles in her hair at Akari, bouncing it off her forehead and drawing a yelp of surprise.

Fortunately, Naruto was a pretty heavy sleeper, so he snoozed straight through the little spat. "Argh, what's the point in a fucking mask if you know who I am anyway?! Anyway, Hokage-sama wants to see you." She looked down at Naruto then back up at Akari. "If you want I'll look after the gaki for you?" Smiling, Akari nodded, subtly checking for Genjutsu and finding none. It was always better safe than sorry, especially involving Naruto, and Komachi didn't mind.

Brushing her hand through Naruto's hair a final time, she grabbed a pillow and carefully slid it between his head and her legs, lowering him down onto the sofa and smirking when he stuck his thumb into his mouth, pushing chakra into her eyes to memorize it with her Sharingan. "I'd appreciate that. So, you doing anything after this? Got a mission or something?" While she spoke, Akari made herself presentable, taming the rats nest her noticeably long hair became and leaving it in a long river running down to the small of her back.

Komachi shook her head, looking out the window. "Nah, I got a few senbon in the leg during my last mission, so the hospital wants me on light duties inside the village only, like delivering messages. But, with the Academy letting out a bunch of fresh Genin, there aren't even many of those, and no way in hell am I taking a fence-painting mission." Snorting, Akari turned away from the mirror she was stood at and grinned at the ANBU. "What?" She asked.

"Oh, nothing, just don't forget that you're talking to the only Shinobi in all of Konoha to have never done a D-rank." Akari nonchalantly buffed her nails on her vest, waiting for a few moments before adding. "And hell no I'm not gonna help them out when I finally get around to asking for a genin team of my own. Those brats can weed gardens and fix fences just fine on their own, I'll just sit pretty on a wall and watch. Anyways, wanted to ask if you want to go for Dango or something after I chat with the Hokage?"

Komachi rolled her eyes, but grinned at Akari. "Sure."

"Ahh, Uchiha-san, go right in."

Nodding to the woman sat at the desk beside the Hokage's door, she strode forward to push the two large doors open, frowning when she saw his advisors stood in the room, while the big man himself was looking out the window across Konoha, his expression not visible as he was facing away. It wasn't that she had anything against them, she just didn't like them too much, always far too focused on the village as a whole over the individual people. If it was necessary, they'd sacrifice thousands to give the village an advantage, and still sleep soundly at night.

While she understood the logic behind it, it certainly didn't give them any favor with her, so she merely grinned as usual and greeted them casually. "Koharu-san, Homura-san, Danzo-san." She tipped her head a tiny bit, the only real respect she gave them. She then faced the Hokage. "Hokage-sama." This time she knelt, waiting as he turned around and frowned.

"Akari-san, please, rise." She did so, watching as he walked to his desk and sat down, steeping his fingers. "Now, I know you just got back, but, well, we must know what even happened. As I recall, you mentioned you had some kind of unstable Jutsu trapped in a barrier seal in the 33rd training grounds, and to keep people from interfering while you found a way to handle it?" Akari nodded along to his words. "I presume this has something to do with that?"

Nodding again, Akari sighed, trying to think of the best way to start. "Well, the anomaly wasn't a Jutsu, it was a special ability of a weapon I came into ownership of recently." Slipping her hand into the pouch on her waist, she pulled the Subtle Knife from her inventory and displayed it. "I can't go into detail because I've not had the time to experiment, but this knife is capable of cutting...to put it simply, rifts. Where they go seems entirely random, and, as I said, I haven't been able to experiment with the limitations." Putting the knife away again, she waved her hand out towards the window.

"I opened one in the training grounds, which is why I came to you to ask about shadow clones. Those can go through the rifts, disperse on the other side, then tell me what the situation is like. Using those I can research a lot of the limitations the rifts have, see if there is any method to the rifts opening or if it is truly random, things like that." Folding her arms over, she huffed. "Unfortunately, a traitor broke my barrier and entered the rift." Hiruzen's eyes widened, though before he could ask questions Akari pressed on. "At the time, all I saw was the tail end of a jonin vest entering the rift, also spotting the edges of the hole fraying. Making an educated guess that the tunnel was about to close and strand whoever went through, I entered the rift as well."

Reaching an arm behind herself, Akari, out of sight of the other occupants in the room, withdrew the Sword of Kusanagi and laid it upon Hiruzen's table, earning a few surprised noises from the advisors, and a very grim line set on the Hokage's lips. Before Akari could elaborate, the Hokage looked up at her, his eyes firm. "And you mean to say that, with this, Orochimaru is a traitor?" Though unhappy with it, Akari nodded.

"I'd be willing to allow a Yamanaka select access to my memories to view what he had planned, though I have certain abilities I would prefer are not known by others." Hiruzen nodded, presuming that she meant her Mangekyo abilities, which was a reasonable thing to wish to hide from a clan of mind-readers. It was more to do with her ability to summon even great Shinobi like Minato which she wanted to hide, but there were also other things like the retrieval of a sword from her inventory.

Reaching out, he lifted the legendary sword, taking it in one hand and drawing it, eyeing the blade closely. "This truly is his blade. I was hoping he would not fall so far as to betray a fellow Konoha shinobi, but...the evidence he left behind here more than verifies this claim." Now it was Akari's turn to be confused. Spotting her look, the old Kage elaborated. "Orochimaru was...experimenting on Konoha orphans. He had several laboratories within Konoha itself, and who knows how many outside of Konoha. We've found some already, but I don't doubt that my old student had contingency plans in place for our finding his experiments."

He sheathed the Kusanagi and laid it down upon the table. "When he disappeared, we were in the midst of planning to catch him red-handed. We were going to confront him in a laboratory where he had several...subjects, some caged with others floating submerged in tubes. Of course, with his disappearance, that plan was annulled, but..." Sarutobi slumped in his chair, the weight of the world visible in the tiredness he displayed. "There was one survivor. Out of dozens. And they were all orphans of Konoha. If things were different, it might even have been Naruto to be floating in one of those tubes."

Though he didn't display it visibly too often, the Hokage was also rather protective of Naruto, owing to the fact that Minato saved the village, Kushina held back the Kyuubi for years, and Akari herself was now performing that same role. Of course, it didn't come close to the lengths Akari would go to just to protect him, but it was still touching. "Hokage-sama, if I may?" The man nodded. "What's done is done. What Orochimaru did was despicable, and he paid the ultimate price for it. All we can do it keep moving on. You said there was one survivor?" The old Kage nodded slowly. "Then make sure that, no matter what happens, he or she is treated right. We are in a strong position as a village. You have, just from the top of my head, dozens of elite-level Jonin and ANBU, hundreds of regular Jonin, and thousands of Chunin and Genin. You still have Jiraiya to rely upon, and I'm sure if worded correctly Tsunade could be brought back, even if only in a medical role. No matter what kind of powers that experimentation gave that survivor, do not let their potential power blind you of how much Konoha has failed them."

Taking a breath after her little speech, Akari folded her arms together. "And of course you have me as well. Just my humble opinion, Hokage-sama." The old man looked at her for a few seconds before smiling, a light chuckle coming from his lips.

"Better words could not be spoken. Now then..." The Kage had Akari recite her full report, before ordering her off for a weeks rest after fighting and defeating one of the three legendary sannin. She could have argued that because of the Kyuubi, she would have been good to go after only a few days, but the glint in his eyes told her two things. Firstly, he wanted her in the village just in case something happened in the aftermath of Orochimaru's death. But, more importantly, he was giving her an opening to spend time with Naruto, as well as... "And Akari-san?" He called just as she made to leave. She turned around to meet his eyes, his grin wide.

"...Enjoy your date."

*Thwack* "Ow, what the-oh."

Lowering the hand she used to bop the ANBU watching her apartment over the head, she planted her hands on her hips. "Tell Hiruzen about my and Komachi's dango visits, that's fine. But, frame them like a date and I'm putting itching powder in your mask, your underclothes, and all your normal gear as well." The owl-masked ANBU blanched behind his porcelain mask, waving his hands about, completely at odds with the image an ANBU would normally portray. "Don't try to say it wasn't you, you're the only one who follows me around everywhere, the other ANBU alternate between watching the apartment and tracking me."

Slouching, he mumbled a quiet "Hai...", ducking his head when she raised a fist to threaten him. With Fukuro's silence secured, she hopped across the gap between buildings, entering her apartment through the same window Komachi did, then almost tripping over the sink when she laid eyes on the unmasked ANBU. She was sat on her sofa, rigid as a pole, with Naruto muttering beside her. The problem? He had her right arm wrapped up in a vice-like grip, tightly enough that she couldn't slip it out. Suppressing a snort, she slipped up behind the pair, reaching over to coax Naruto's arms off of Komachi and onto her own, quickly switching her arms around to lift him up, all without waking him.

"Thanks." She whispered quietly to the red-faced ANBU, walking off to drop Naruto off into bed, quickly tucking him in with a peck on his forehead then leaving the room and pulling the door closed, but not before quickly scribbling a note that she was going out and that there was some food wrapped up in foil for him to eat on the side. With that, she walked back down the hallway, smiling at Komachi who returned it. "Well, shall we be off?"

Komachi nodded, getting up from the sofa and making for the window, only to have her arm gripped by Akari, then being pulled towards the door. "Oh no, we're not going out like that. God damn it, would it kill you to leave a building like a normal Shinobi once in a while?" She quickly whipped a finger up to silence Komachi, who had a smug grin and her lips open to retort. "I came in like that today, yes, but that was because I had you watching Naruto, I didn't want to leave you with him too long. Not that I don't trust ya, I do, honestly. I just know he can be a handful sometimes." She shivered slightly remembering some of the more...disgusting incidents around him. He was a joy to raise, sure, but even amazing things can be nightmares at the same time.

Placated, Komachi let herself be dragged across the apartment to the front door, casting a glance over at her abandoned ANBU gear. With a shrug, she decided to just leave it there. Akari once showed her the seals array she had set up across her apartment, and it was complicated enough to compete with the barrier surrounding Konoha itself in complexity and sheer mind-boggling fuckery. Komachi fancied herself as a bit of a seals user, but even she couldn't make heads or tails of the seals Akari used to protect her home.

However, in her eyes, that was a good thing. She knew how much Akari valued Naruto, and that she'd go to any lengths to protect him, so having a seal that even a seals user couldn't make anything out of meant trying to shut it down would be akin to reaching into a blender and sticking your fingers through the blades trying to find the off switch. And of course, that meant that leaving her ANBU gear in there would be arguably safer than putting it in an ANBU locker.

Stepping through the door and thanking Akari for holding it, she waited as the Uchiha closed the door, locked it, then pressed her hand against it to activate the seals attached to it, which also then leap-frogged across the invisible ink running along the ceiling to each entry point and activating all the seals there. Outside of Akari and Naruto, nobody could unlock those seals. If someone tried to, it'd send a warning to Akari thanks to a small invisible seal inked on her wrist, the signal running off the same seal matrix as the Hiraishin, but instead of transporting mass, which is hard, it just transported the small 'battery' of chakra rigged up to the seal, which would flare the seal on her wrist and tell her that her seal had been tampered with.

"So, which dango shop? I know there was one that opened on that long road between the Hyuuga compound and that Yakiniku place, according to Anko it's r-..." Akari stopped and winced. "How the fuck did I forget about her?" Blinking, Komachi raised an eyebrow. "Uhh, I don't actually know if I can even say anything, I think it involves an S-rank...ahh fuck it, I'll take the consequences, not like Hiruzen can kill me for telling ya. Orochimaru was a traitor and experimented on a bunch of orphans, and I killed him when I caused an...accident involving something I found. I won't bother elaborating, but...fuck. You have any idea where Anko would be about now? I haven't been in Konoha for a while so I don't know where she'll be."

Shaking her head, Komachi gestured towards the vague direction of the T&I building. "Well, I know she was hoping to apprentice over there once she was done apprenticing under the snake-sannin, maybe she'd be there?" She shrugged, not really knowing, but Akari latched onto it, quickly wrapping her up in a hug before darting off, jumping from building to building but stopping after a few moments and turning back to face her, beckoning her to come with her.

"Well come on then, let's go find her!"

Planting her chin on her hands, Anko looked around the room again, frowning.

She didn't know what was going on, she was supposed to meet her sensei a few days ago so she could demonstrate how much she'd improved on using the Hidden Shadow Snake Hands summoning Jutsu, but he never showed up to the training grounds that day. Or the next. On the third day, she'd finally gone to the Hokage to ask if he was being pulled away for a mission and didn't have time to tell her or something, but he told her nothing and in the end, she ended up just practising alone and wondering what the hell was going on.

She finally decided that if her sensei was busy she'd just get on with her other project, which was getting herself ingratiated with the T&I Shinobi, as that was where she wanted to end up after Orochimaru-sensei was finished with her. Thus, she ended up working with Shinobu Mibu for the day, sorting files, handling minor issues, and generally learning the lesser-known side of T&I. Most Shinobi saw it as a deep, dank and dark dungeon where criminals were thrown into and tortured for all they knew, then killed and dumped in a ditch.

That was definitely one of their prerogatives, but more often than not they worked side-by-side with the Uchiha Military Police to handle disputes. The mere presence of a T&I Chunin was usually enough to convince the arguing parties to settle their differences, and if not then they would act as a mediator. If it was too much to handle, it would then be pushed towards the higher-ups. If it went further still, it'd find its way into either Inoichi's hands, or sometimes even the Hokage's office, to handle.

After dealing with a few cases, Shinobu called that it was time for lunch, leading Anko along through the labyrinthian building to finally reach the cafeteria. It wasn't by accident that the building was so maze-like, any escaped Shinobi would have a hell of a time trying to find their way out once they were placed within the bowels of the building. "Hey Anko!" A cheery voice called across the room, startling the snake-summoner and making her yelp as she dropped her head from her hands, but stopped herself from falling before she could hit her head and embarrass herself even more.

Standing up and looking towards where the voice came from, a smile crept onto her face as she saw Akari stood next to someone she didn't know. She hadn't seen Akari for over half a week, so maybe she knew where Orochimaru had gotten off to. Perhaps they even went on the same mission. She snapped herself out of her thoughts before they could spiral however and raised a hand in greeting, wandering over quickly where the pair were waiting. "Heya Akari, and uhh...hi! I'm Anko." She stuck a hand out at the unidentified blonde, smiling all the while.

"Hi...I'm Komachi." The blonde stuck her own hand out and gripped Anko's, giving it a firm shake before releasing her and turning to slightly face Akari, subtly redirecting the conversation towards her. Following Komachi's lead, Anko looked at Akari, who looked a bit...uncomfortable.

"Right, well, uhh, we should probably talk about this somewhere private. Oh, and yeah, I have something to tell you, something kinda...sorta world-shatteringly big, so...yeah." Blinking, Anko looked at Komachi, who just shrugged and gestured at Akari. "So, you got anywhere good and private around here where we can talk? This might be a bit higher than I'm really meant to tell you, so probably best nobody overhears us by chance." She whispered the last part, wary of the people coming and going. Several gave their little group curious looks but bypassed them in favour of coming to and from the cafeteria.

"O-kay? Well, there's a few private offices a few hallways across we can use, they have silencing seals and can only be unlocked from the outside by Inoichi, so nobody can just accidentally walk in on us, that sound good?" Akari stuck a thumb up at her, and Komachi just looked a bit confused as to why Akari was going through the effort to do all this. Leading the group on, Anko sent occasional glances at the pair following her.

Her first impulsive thought was that it was a henge or something, but logic ruled that out instantly. Nobody emitting any kind of active-jutsu chakra were allowed inside the building, it was too high-profile to allow anything tricky like that. There was the minor chance they snuck in, but there were detection seals inked every dozen steps or so which would pick up on the foreign chakra signals and send a building-wide alert out of intruders. The building housed plenty of high-value targets and intel, so security was taken extremely seriously.

Her next, and more logic-based thought, was that something had happened to Orochimaru, and Akari wasn't supposed to tell her about it, but wanted to anyway, presumably to pay her back for looking after Monty and Naruto when Akari was unable to, and didn't have anyone else who were willing to look after not just her pet snake, but also look after Naruto. As Anko loved snakes and was pretty fond of Naruto, she was a perfect fit for looking after the pair when Akari got dragged into an emergency mission and had no time for a child and snake-minder.

Pushing open the door, Anko let the other two enter the room, closing the door behind herself before activating the seals attached to the door, which tied into the rest of the array when it closed, making the room about as private as possible. "Okay, now spill Akari, you know something. So, what's going on?" Sighing, Akari took one of the chairs in the room and rolled it towards Anko, setting another behind Komachi before sitting down herself with a slump, shifting so her chair came rolling to a stop beside Anko.

"Okay, I'm gonna just band-aid tear this for you, Orochimaru is dead." Anko's eyes widened drastically. Dead? He couldn't be dead, he was one of the three sannin, they were basically unbeatable. Whoever killed him must have been terrifying. "That's...not all though. He didn't die to...well, technically he did, but an enemy to him, not to Konoha." Anko let her confusion show plainly on her face.

"Wait, so...you aren't saying...he didn't?..." Akari reached an arm out and rubbed Anko's arm, a sympathetic look etched onto her face as Anko processed her words. "Oh Kami, he did..." Despite how strong she was, Anko still let a single tear roll down her cheek. Despite the aloofness, she was so grateful to the sannin for taking her under his wing and teaching her, letting her sign the snake-summons contract, and saving her from a miserable existence buried within the Genin corps. To hear that such a man actually became an enemy of Konoha before his death was heartbreaking.

Sighing, Akari let her hand roam up and down Anko's arm, providing some small measure of comfort to the teen. "I would...want to tell you he didn't suffer...that his end came after redemption or some bullshit like that, but I know you'd hate me for it. What I will say is that, in the end, I was the one to fight him." Anko's eyes snapped to her in disbelief. "Honestly. I tried to make it as painless as possible, but he didn't exactly want to go quietly, so it was a...brutal fight. I won in the end of course...but it was not a clean fight by any stretch of the imagination. If not for the Kyuubi-" She heard and subsequently ignored the growling from Kurama in favour of giving the staring Anko her full attention. "-then I wouldn't be sitting here today."

She licked her lips, having become dry during her talking, and stopped her arm, her hand resting atop Anko's shoulder. A few moments passed before Anko closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and centring herself. "I-" She bit her lip. "I need some space I think. I know you, Akari, I know you wouldn't lie to me, it's just that...I knew that man since I was 9 years old, and...it's hard to accept that he's dead, let alone that he'd betray the village." With a sympathetic smile, Akari pressed Anko's shoulder for a brief moment.

"It's fine. Just...ask the Hokage if you really have to know everything, I told him most of what happened, so he can fill you in if he deems it necessary. And of course, if he holds anything back and says it's a secret, next time I'm out of the village maybe Naruto and you could visit him. I'm sure his tongue would be looser if his unofficial grandson were to ask about it." Akari winked, jabbing her elbow gently into Anko's ribs and eliciting a light chuckle from the girl.

"Alright, alright, I get it, now shoo! I do have a job to do around here y'know!" Smiling at being able to draw Anko's normal side out a little, she stood up alongside Komachi, waiting as Anko unsealed the door. Unbidden, Komachi laid her own hand on Akari's shoulder. With a grin, she turned to look at her friend, who was smiling softly.

"So, dango?" Those two words were overheard by Anko, who immediately barreled over and demanded that they bring her back some. Chuckling at the contrast of Anko from the girl who needed space to the girl who wants a pile of dango, Akari promised to bring a few skewers over after they went out. As the left the room, Anko yelled something which made both of their ears burn red, whilst Akari silently cursed her low luck stat.

"Enjoy your date!"

Ta-da!

This was fun to write. Dealing with the aftermath of what happened, and introducing a shiny new character who I've somehow already fallen in love with. Komachi is such a blank slate, so I can do basically anything I want with her. The only stipulations are that she's in ANBU, and she has big needles in her hair. So, having her suddenly coming in like that is fun.

I think I've figured out why my stories feel different to other peoples. I write 'inclusively'. It's like...trusting that you guys know most of the Naruto Universe, so I don't spend an hour explaining what characters look like, or how a Jutsu works, I just...write it. Because of that, it flows way better than me describing what all these different characters look like and their relationships. I let my writing do the talking.

And please, if you can, support me on Pat reon, it means the world to me, and I'd really appreciate the support! Hope you all enjoyed!

OMAKE:

"ALRIGHT!"

As the Rolling Table came to a stop, a little green potion popped out.

Stat Reset Potion!

All stats will be reset to their base amounts, and all points will be freely allocatable. Single-use.

"Well, bottoms up!" Without another moment lost, Akari chugged down her potion, immediately feeling the effects as she moved lethargically, at least in comparison to what she was used to. With slow-moving hands she opened her stats menu and grinned. "Let's go for...this!" With one finger, she pressed down on the plus icon of a single stat and poured all two-hundred and thirty-five points into it, bring it to a grand total of 241.

Unbeknownst to Akari, upon doing this, Uchiha Madara, who was eating some thin soup, choked on his food and died of suffocation. When Black Zetsu appeared from a wall in surprise and tried to aid him, his foot caught on a branch, leaving his throat impaled on a deceptively-strong piece of wood. In a hidden lab, Orochimaru tripped up, his flailing hand hitting a button which released all the imprisoned orphans. His head then struck the side of a table, snapping his neck and instantly killing him.

"Hmm, don't feel luckier."

Name: Akari Uchiha

Level: 48

Age: 15

Experience: 37221/48000

To Next Level: 10779

Title: Sannin-slayer - Defeating one of the three legendary sannin is no easy feat, but you managed it. Future opportunities unlocked.

Secondary Title: Tokubetsu Jonin - +25% experience gained during solo missions.

Health Points: 6500 - (100 Base + (Vit x End)) x 5

Regeneration Rate - 1200/m - 20/s - Vit x End - Halted when afflicted with bleed status.

Chakra Points: 5000 - (100 Base + (Int x Wis)) x 5

Regeneration Rate - 500/m - 15/s - Int x Wis - Halted when continuous chakra drain Jutsu in use.

Strength - 55

Vitality - 40

Endurance - 30

Intelligence - 30

Agility - 50

Wisdom - 30

Luck - 30

Chakra Nature(s): Fire - Primary, Lightning - Secondary